If Walls Could Speak
by Naked-toes
Summary: England/Reader. Narrator is a house. Go figure.


Hello.

I know that, even if this message does make it to you, it will seem very strange. You may not know who I am, where I am from or what my intentions are. But, I assure you, you have known me for much, much longer than you think. I saw everything you did when you lived under my roof and, ever so possibly, a little that you didn't. You might not understand why I'm telling this to you and, believe me, even I'm not sure. But I am. And I only hope that whatever my message intends to do, it manages to do so, whether that is to change the world, or just make you realise what you left behind. What you left behind with me.

You were fresh out of high school and desperately in love. Your parents tried to warn you, but you shook them off; they had never been in love, they had never felt the way you did. And he, this Arthur Kirkland, well, he was just too important to you, too good to ignore. You married the moment you graduated, bought a run down house that nobody else wanted and moved in.

And that's where I came into your life.

Apparently, you humans have a saying; something about walls being able to talk. Until now, that's probably seemed just like a worthless cliché to you; a phrase flung around far too often and with hardly any meaning left. And, until now, that would be understandable. But now, now I am able to tell you what needs to be told. Whether you believe me or not is up to you, but please just take the time to at least listen.

Because, [Name], I am your walls and I have finally found a voice.

I'll understand if you don't believe me. If I was in your position, I wouldn't believe it. It probably feels like a trick, a joke played on you by the very same people who tormented you throughout your school life. You were so lonely, so very lonely. But trust me, I understand what it's like to be lonely, to want company so much that you'd endure almost any pain for it, to watch as others find happiness and you are left alone. I was abandoned for fifty years, [Name]. _Fifty years! _Can you imagine what it's like left to be left for so long, desperate to latch onto the first thing that seems to show you the slightest bit of attention?

Of course you can; that's exactly why you felt such a desperate need to hang onto Arthur, isn't it. You've never admitted it, but it is, isn't it? Don't be ashamed, not of that anyway; loneliness is one of the deadliest diseases known to man; infections and cuts may cause physical damage, but loneliness, loneliness strips you of all that once made you you, turning it into a bottomless pit of despair and self-hatred. Anybody would want to escape from that. No matter what it did in the long run.

I feel like I should first thank you, thank you for saving me. Without you, I would have been left alone, forgotten until the demolition teams came. You saved me [Name], saved me from the very loneliness Arthur saved you from.

But that's not what I'm here to talk about; I'm here to talk about all that I have seen, of you and of him.

Everything seemed fine for the first few years the two of you seemed to be doing fine. Sometimes I'd even say a little _too_ fine; I learned more about human anatomy in the first six months of your occupancy as I had learned in my entire existence previously. I can't understand the appeal myself, but I suppose it must mean something to you humans. But that period of joy, where you lay back and laughed at your parent's fears together, was not to last.

I'd say it started to go downhill from the time your first child was born. A daughter, wild and boisterous, with her fathers fiery green eyes and, much to your dismay, his eyebrows too. I remember when you first brought her in; remember wondering what the fleshy slug you were carrying in your arms was for. I'm still waiting for an answer, by the way. Both of you were trying to act like proud parents, but there was this weird feeling between you, one of distance, of something lost. But I suppose you shrug it off as baby blues and carried on with your life.

It took you years to admit what was happening, took you years to admit that your parents had been right. Because you had been too hasty in marrying this man, too desperate to say no to the first person to care about you. It was a sad, sad truth, but it was indisputable.

You no longer loved your husband.

Something in the back of your mind told you to talk about it. But you knew that doing so would be like admitting there was something wrong. So you did nothing, telling yourself it was for the sake of your daughter. Until, one day, when your child was six, you couldn't hide it any longer.

You told her to get her coat and left, leaving only a note behind.

It should have been all over, at least from your perspective. But trust me; it was nowhere near the end. Its your choice to accept it or not, but the letter you received from the police, the events it mentioned, you were at least partly to blame for them.

Without you, your husband, your Artie, lost everything that kept him together. Even if he no longer loved you either, there was still nothing for him to base his life around other than you and your child. He lost his compass, his anchor, his _everything_. And he couldn't think of anything to support him other than drink. And you know as well as I do how that ended.

[Name], by now you are probably either throwing this letter away or bursting into tears, calling me a liar, a fool, an evil, evil person. I'm not. I'm just telling you this so that you know the truth of what happened. I only hope that one day you will be able to tell the truth to your daughter, your beautiful, beautiful daughter. And besides, you saved me once, so I feel I must return the favor.

[Name], your husband is dead. You know it as well as I do. You might try to deny it, to refuse to accept what you've done. But accepting it will be, not only the best thing for you, but the right thing to do. You don't have to tell her, you don't have to tell her why her beloved daddy is gone. But at least tell her he is.

Why am I telling you this, you might ask.

Because, [Name],

I am your walls

_And I can finally speak._


End file.
